Crime & Safety
Allied Gardens Freezer-Body Investigation Shelved
A woman's body was found a year ago in a freezer at an Allied Gardens home.
SAN DIEGO, CA — Pending any revealing new facts that might surface at some point, authorities have closed their inconclusive investigation into the death of a woman whose body was found a year ago in a freezer at an Allied Gardens home.
Relatives visiting from out of town discovered Mary Haxby-Jones dead inside the chest-style food-storage appliance at the residence in the 4900 block of Zion Avenue late on the morning of Dec. 22, 2023, according to the San Diego Police Department. Her body bore no signs of suspicious injuries.
In an autopsy report recently completed by the county Medical Examiner's Office, Haxby-Jones' manner and cause of death went down as undetermined.
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"At this point, based on the medical examiner's conclusions and the investigative work performed by (police) detectives, the suspicious-death investigation is inactive pending any additional or new information brought forward," SDPD Lt. Jud Campbell said Thursday.
Detectives believe that Haxby-Jones -- who would have been 81 years old at the time when her remains were found -- had lived at the Zion Avenue home at some point and that she could have been missing or dead for up to nine years,
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Based on interviews and other evidence, investigators eventually decided that her body had been unlawfully put in the freezer by her husband, Robert Haxby, who died on Feb. 3 of this year, according to police.
As the medical examiner's inquiry was running its course, SDPD homicide detectives -- who were heading the police side of the case due to its "unusual circumstances" -- contacted Social Security and Veterans Affairs authorities, suspecting that, murder or not, Haxby-Jones' death might have been concealed so that her benefits would continue to be paid.
That attempt to solve the mystery also proved to be a dead end.
"At this point, a criminal case of benefits fraud cannot be substantiated because it is unclear beyond a reasonable doubt exactly when Haxby-Jones died," Campbell said Thursday.
— City News Service
